Drumhead Pulsation
by Nuklear Firefly
Summary: 50 fic challenge surrounding Anji, Baiken, and Chipp. 50 individual drabbles, mixed genres.
1. Trust

**Trust**

Thin, blue smoke was curling up through the falling autumn leaves, spiralling and twisting in the crisp breeze. The sun had sunk below the horizon some minutes before, leaving the sky behind it a rapidly darkening lavender. Baiken took a long draw from her pipe, ignoring the way the damp, chill air managed to seep in through her layers of clothing. As the stars began to dimly flicker to life in the fading dusk, she found herself wishing, a bit sorely, that she had some warm sake. Nights like this just begged for warm sake.

Footsteps. The rounin paused, pipe held loosely between her teeth. Somebody was coming towards her, footfalls soft but purposeful, almost rythmic. She knew that walk. Difficult not to, with all the years he had been following her around, acting like some idiot knight in shining armor. A smile twitched onto her lips, imperceptible to any who didn't know her incredibly well. And she only let one person close enough to know such things.

A sake bottle was set down beside her, gently. Two cups. Of course. He wouldn't want to miss out on watching the leaves. Beautiful scenery, fading sunlight... it was all poetic in a way that she couldn't quite comprehend, but he could. Baiken usually just sat back and enjoyed nature's beauty for what it was; Anji tended to wax poetic about all of it.

He could be such a damn woman.

"Thanks," she said gruffly, glancing out of the corner of her eye at him as he eased down to sit beside her. Anji's usual, slightly goofy smile answered her.

"I know how you like warm sake on a cold night." He poured out two cups, holding one out to her. Count on Anji to know exactly how to position himself so that she wouldn't have to reach her only arm around at an odd angle. It was a little disconcerting, how much Anji could be counted on for. The fan-user's smile grew a little more gentle as he clinked his cup against hers. _"Kanpai."_

The warm sake went down smooth, warming her to the tips of her fingers and toes. Baiken relaxed, her smile twitching wider. Only Anji could make her feel so peaceful. They fell into a comfortable silence, drinking the sake as they watched the leaves flutter down. After some time of sitting side-by-side, Anji wrapped an arm around her, gently pulling her over and hugging her close. She allowed this. After a moment's pause, she let her head fall over to rest on his shoulder, a little surprised how comfortable it all was.

Just this once, she could let him have his way.

**Author's Notes: **So I thought I'd tackle the 50 fic challenge, with Anji, Baiken, and Chipp (and any combination therein) as my character focus. I love the way they play off of each other, so they should be a lot of fun to write~

Besides, I play Baiken at Gouon Hashi RPG on Inksome and could use the extra chance to write her. (By the way, any roleplayers out there reading this, check it out! We need some Guilty Gear people! -PLUG PLUG: .com/communities/gouon_hashi -)


	2. Annoy

**Annoy**

"Would you two quit talkin' in all Japanese?!" Chipp raged indignantly, bright red eyes narrowed on his two friends. "You guys know I can't keep up, I don't know that much yet!"

"That's the point," Baiken drawled, taking a long draw from her pipe. She wasn't even looking at him. The redhead breathed out the smoke, adding, "Shithead gaijin."

_"I'm not a gaijin!"_

"Well... Chipp, you really are," Anji said calmly, a sheepish grin on his face. When the albino ninja whirled on him with a look that clearly pleaded You Should Be On My Side, the dancer continued, "The word just means somebody not from Japan."

"Which you're not," Baiken tacked on, a hint of vicious amusement in her voice. Chipp bristled, drawing himself up to his full height.

"You wanna take this outside, cyclops?" he snapped, conveniently forgetting that calling the swordswoman such a thing could quite possibly end with him dead. Baiken's lone eye narrowed furiously, the redhead rising to her feet much faster than she should be able to. Anji was up just as quickly, stepping between his two friends to keep them from killing one another.

"Chipp," he said, tone carefully polite and neutral, "please just wait for us outside for a minute, okay?"

The ninja left the room stiffly, sitting outside the door for a moment and listening as Baiken raged. Anji's voice drifted through the door, little more than a soothing murmur, and the woman's angry ranting slowed and stopped. Time passed. Chipp grew impatient quickly, going from tapping his foot to trying to listen through the door to pacing to throwing shuriken at the opposite wall. And then he had an Idea.

Chipp's ideas were rarely good ones, but he tended to think them brilliant.

Ninja skills were amazingly useful when you wanted to sneak into a room and spy on your friends.

Cloaked in invisibility, the American ninja crept along the wall, carefully listening to try and pick up on what Anji and Baiken were trying to keep a secret from him. Whatever it was, Baiken seemed completely uninterested and Anji seemed excited. It wasn't until he was practically at the table that he noticed that they were still jabbering away in their native tongue, far too fast for him to keep up or understand completely. He thought he caught his name in there somewhere, maybe 'party', but that was just a guess. But he still took it to mean there was a party and he wasn't invited.

His bristling at that was nothing compared to the bristling he did when Baiken growled, "We know you're there, dumbass."

"What the fuck, you guys?!" Chipp snapped, dropping his invisibility with a slight _pop _noise. "What party and why can't I go?!"

Anji sighed, shaking his head. Baiken rolled her eye and cast an exasperated look at her fellow Japanese. "I told you it wasn't worth trying to plan a surprise birthday party for this dipshit."


	3. Confide

_Author's Notes: _Inspired by Bridget's story mode on Accent Core+. :D

**Confide**

Mito Anji was a fairly difficult man to surprise. He prided himself on his ability to sense those around him, his full awareness of his surroundings. Very rarely did something catch him unaware, but this was one of those occasions.

The dancer had been comfortably situated in the long, lush grass of a hillside, watching the sunrise, when he could just _feel _somebody approaching. The prescence was a familiar one, not threatening in the slightest. He perked up, shifting into a sitting position and craning his neck back with a smile of greeting situated on his face. The person stopped, looking down at him with a bemused look spared for the way he was leaning his head back.

The smile slipped off his face for a moment as the shock set in when he realized it was Baiken he was staring at upside-down.

"A....ane-san?!" he stammered, scrabbling slightly as he turned to face her properly. Definitely had _not _been expecting that. "What brings you here? Isn't this a little out of the way?"

The swordswoman paused, an almost embarassed look on her face. Her lonely eye rolled skyward in an attempt to avoid his gaze. For a moment, Anji was fixated on the thought that she looked beautiful with the pastel sky behind her, her scarlet hair toyed with gently by the wind. Just as he was beginning to wonder if she noticed he was staring, she finally spoke. "I was looking for you."

_For me?! _A wide, brilliant smile split across Anji's face. "You were? What can I do for you, my Japanese beauty?"

Baiken sighed, rolling her eye, shoulders slumping as if under a tremendous weight. "Cut the crap, Anji. I needed to ask you a favor."

"Wow, you're not even gonna hit me for that?" the dancer asked, surprised for the second time in just a few minutes. "It must be serious."

The redhead nodded, sinking down to sit in the grass beside him. It wasn't until she was eye-level with him that Anji noticed her cheeks tinged slightly pink. She was still avoiding his eyes, even going so far as to let her bangs shield her eye from him. Concern stirred like a tsunami, threatening to swell up and crash over him.

"Look, Anji, I don't want to hear any shit from you about this," Baiken started warningly, finally glancing over and giving him a hard glare. "And if you laugh, I swear I will rip you limb from limb."

"No laughing, no joking," Anji promised solemnly. "I promise. Anything for you."

Another sigh. "....I need you to check in on that Bridget kid for me."

"You need... what." Bridget? That kid with the yoyo and the freakish teddy bear? Since when did...

"Look, it's just that he's walking right into deep trouble and I'd hate to see a kid as young as him get killed by that musician bitch in red. I tried to stop him, but he didn't listen to me. Can you go try and knock some sense into the kid?"

The concern tsunami turned into one of fierce adoration. Anji smiled warmly, squashing down a growing urge to hug the woman tight. She could be so cute without meaning to be. There she was, battered and grizzled and gruff, outlined against a soft pink sky, worry in her lone peach eye, sincerely asking for help watching out for some kid neither of them really knew.

He satisfied his need to make some sort of fond gesture by gently tucking her hair behind her ear.

"You really care about that kid, huh?" he asked softly. She snorted.

"Shut up. Just making sure he doesn't get killed."

Anji chuckled. "I'll give it a shot."

"...thanks."

After a moment, Anji could suppress his teasing nature no longer. "My, my, Baiken. First you looked out for Chipp, now you're keeping an eye on Bridget. Is this your maternal side showing?"

As Baiken roared a furious _shut the hell up_ at him and swung with her sword, the dancer nimbly dodged aside, laughing, and jogged off to do as she had asked.


End file.
